Busy Mom’s Cooking Hacks: 5 Non-Food Things You Can Make In A Crock Pot

Are you still making food in your crock pot? What a NOOB. Just kidding, I am too. It wasn’t until recently as I was time-warping through Pinterest that I discovered you can also make a bunch of weird, random crap in your slow cooker. If you are sick of using your slow cooker for food like a chump, you’ve come to the right place.

My first foray into non-food crock pot cooking was when I used my slow cooker to make wassail for my family. If you’ve never heard of wassail before, then come visit me in the German oasis of New Braunfels, Texas. Every year we attend Wassailfest in the downtown square of the city, which basically means that we drunk drive strollers around on blocked-off city streets and taste test wassail served from roadside crock pots to vote on who makes the best spiked wassail in all the land. Yes, this is a true story.

The point of the matter is this. Use your crock pot for anything and everything, even the really weird stuff, starting with:

1. Make Wassail: Wassail is amazing, and you better believe that I will be using this recipe to celebrate Wassailfest in the fall. Also, the recipe calls for Tang, which is kind of white trash and makes me like it even more.

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2. Make Candles: Why are you still buying candles like a capitalist heathen? Start making them in your crock pot right NOW.

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3. Dye Yarn: Warning, if you like to follow rules, you are only supposed to dye yarn in a crock pot that is no longer used for cooking—because poison, and all that stuff.

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4. Make Soap: If you run out of soap because some jerk didn’t leave you any in the shower (ahem), you can use your crock pot to whip up more in a pinch.

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5. Make Play Dough: If you are a mom, then you know your kid is going to eat Play Dough sooner or later, and you’ll spend hours on Google examining and comparing pictures of their poop. Or, you could just make this non-toxic crock pot Play Dough instead and stop checking your toddler’s teeth for doughy residue.

I distinctly remember googling “does ‘non toxic’ on the Play Doh label really mean non toxic” for my older son. For my younger, not so much. I typically throw him a stick of celery too and call it a fairly balanced meal.

MellissaMooretes321

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http://overthecuckoonest.blogspot.com/ Kay_Sue

I’m not Maria. I respect and admire her, but unfortunately, am not her.

I am, however, very popular with you in particular, spambot. How are you today?

Do you think your crockpot would taste like soap after you did this? I got into dehydrating fruit but a friend told me she dehydrated flowers once and everything tasted like flowers after that so she had to buy a new dehydrator.

http://overthecuckoonest.blogspot.com/ Kay_Sue

I reckon it depends on your crockpot, but ceramic inserts typically don’t hold odors or tastes (in my experience). Otherwise, you’d probably want a different crockpot for every meal, right? I imagine? I don’t know, but it is a good question.

Elisa Probert

You csn dye yarn with food coloring or Kool-Aid in the crock pot. Then it’s okay to keep using for food. Kool-Aid makes pretty colors on wool and smells much better than chemical dyes! Aaaaand I don’t think I’d feed it to kids seeing how it doesn’t wash out. I’ll add some pics here later of my favorite Kool-Aid dyed yarns. Did mine on t ge stovetop as I didn’t have my crockpot yet.

Bethany Ramos

Yes, pics!!

Elisa Probert

This is a skein I dyed, then spun, for an “Inspired By Poetry” challenge. First poem that came to mind was “In Flander’s Field” as the challenge happened to fall over memorial day last year. The red is a mixture of Strawberry and Cherry Kool-Aid, the blue is Berry Blue, and the green is one part Berry Blue to three parts lemonade. I’m looking for the perfect pattern to knit or crochet it into.

A shawl made of a wispy fine yarn I spun, this was spun first, then dyed. The red is Black Cherry and the gold is Peach Mango. I love that it magically worked into a stripe pattern as I crocheted! It’s a small shawl, perfect for summer time. Also, I figured out that my back porch is the best place to take pictures showing my yarns in natural light.

It’s actually a lot of fun, too. It works best on wool or another protein-based fiber. I have a friend who unschools her kids, and her daughter got a kick out of the whole process when they tryed it. (nice thing about Kool-Aid dying, non-toxic unless you consider food coloring poisonous!)

Rachel Sea

I make spiced cider and mulled wine in my crock pot every winter, because it’s delicious and makes the house smell fantastic. That wassail recipe is not okay. Tang and Red Hots? NOPE.

Bethany Ramos

I know, I am white trash and was like, um….

Rachel Sea

It’s not even cheaper than using cinnamon sticks and a real orange.

Valerie

DR THUNDER

Bethany Ramos

LOL!

Jennifer Freeman

Nothing good ever starts with ‘Tang’.

Lee

I almost bought Tang the other day. Then I though there is probably a reason I haven’t drank it in 20 years and walked away.

Maria Guido

I had no idea that still existed!

Spongeworthy

Do you feel like sharing how you do the mulled wine? I’ve done cider before but I would love to do some wine.

Rachel Sea

I start with Two Buck Chuck’s Merlot, but any fruity wine is good. A tannic wine wants sugar to taste nice when mulled. My crockpot holds 4 bottles of wine, so if your crock pot is smaller you maybe want to reduce some of this accordingly. On a doubled up piece of cheesecloth I pile up a couple cinnamon sticks, about a tablespoon of whole cloves, about a teaspoon of orange peel, 10 or so cardamom pods that I’ve smushed with a rolling pin, a big pinch of dehydrated ginger, and a big pinch of whole allspice corns that I’ve cracked with a big spoon. If I have vanilla beans I’ll add half of one, split lengthwise. I knot up the cheesecloth as tight as I can, drop it in to the wine on low. I remove it after an hour or when the wine is gone, whichever comes first. If there is any leftover wine, it can be poured into a glass bottle or jar and reheated later.

The lil’ dippers (small crockpot) also make nice air fresheners. Fill 1/3 with water, add a few tsps of baking soda, and a drop or two of essential oil. Or add some vanilla extract. Or a few orange peels and a few cloves.